Scientists working on the development and genetics of zebrafish, as a model system, have very few interactions with the greater communities of comparative biologists and ichthyologists. The major goal of the proposed meeting is to bring these groups together and to foster interactions and exchanges that may open up new avenues of interdisciplinary research. The symposium and associated activities (contributed paper and poster sessions) will take place over two days at the annual meeting of the Society of Integrative and Comparative Biology (SICB) in January 2006 in Orlando, Florida. The symposium covers a broad range of topics in fish biology, including systematics, genomics, developmental genetics, neurobiology, and behavior. The fourteen invited speakers include researchers, using newly available genome sequences for zebrafish and other teleosts to understand fundamental aspects offish and genome evolution. Others focus on comparative studies in fish or are more traditional zebrafish developmental biologists trying to understand how the skeleton and nervous system form. All of these have been chosen for their interest in comparative biology. The selection of speakers includes many junior investigators, and both graduate students and postdoctoral fellows will be encouraged to attend and present posters. Symposium papers will be published as a special issue of the Journal of Experimental Zoology - Molecular and Developmental Evolution. This will be an important first step in making the vast amount of developmental and genetic information about zebrafish more accessible to the comparative biology community, as well as educating zebrafish researchers as to the relationship of their organism to other animals. [unreadable] [unreadable]